Sears Holdings Corp. has named OgilvyOne its direct marketing and CRM agency of record, with responsibility for both the Sears and Kmart brands.

Johnson & Johnson has picked Vidal Partnership and La Comunidad to head up its US Hispanic account, which has an estimated value of close to $75 million.

With a new Yahoo partnership, e-mail deliverability services firm Return Path has expanded its Sender Score Certified whitelist to cover more than 1.2 billion e-mail inboxes.

Restoration Hardware Inc. has accepted a takeover offer from Catterton Partners for $179 million, significantly less than the $279 million the private equity firm offered before Restoration Hardware's holiday sales results were posted.

Search engine RedZee.com has abandoned text-based results, replacing them with visual screen shots of Web sites. Rather than having about 10 text results per page, the new RedZee Search 2.0 enables users to fan through 100 Web page images, allowing them to preview search results faster, said Ryan Krupnick, VP of RedZee.

Following the recent beginning-of-the-year prognosti­cations that marketing analysts shared, you'd be forgiven for predicting that 2008 might be a slightly quieter year for mar­keting M&A than the blockbuster year that was 2007. But last week's news that InfoUSA was acquiring the highly respected firm Direct Media not only started the year off with a decent bang; it also yielded a promise from chairman and CEO Vin Gupta that the industry would further fuse. Not many people could convincingly state that a key corporate strategy was to "consolidate the direct marketing industry," but Gupta defi­nitely has the heft to be one of them.

After several months of negotiations, and discussions with other potential suitors, 39-year old firm Direct Media will become the latest company to come under the umbrella of Omaha-based direct marketing giant, InfoUSA.

In its annual report for fiscal year 2007, the US Postal Service reports that it had a net loss of $5.1 billion, largely because of the impact of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA) of 2006.

NEW LISTS - Acton International Ltd. - Description: This file contains Internet enthusiasts who are comfortable conducting their personal and professional purchasing activities online. These technology-savvy consumers use the Internet to find the latest offers, best deals, and the newest items available. These individuals are credit card impulse buyers who enjoy shopping from home.

NEW LISTS - eTargetMedia.com Inc.Description: This file contains online users who have requested to receive information regarding debt elimination, debt consolidation and refinancing. Through an affiliate network, subscribers are directed to Web sites where they have requested to receive information

E-MAIL - Atlantic List Co. - Description: This file contains high dollar Democratic and progressive donors nationwide. Donors receive regular e-mail correspondence pertaining to the latest news about the 2008 political campaigns and upcoming presidential election.

NEW SELECTS - Rickard List Marketing - Description: This file contains IT decision makers who are actively involved in various projects including evaluating their company's eBusiness infrastructure, enterprise software, portfolio management, network security, training and software applications. They visit gantthead.com daily to access resources, articles, downloads and insight on everything from Business Intelligence/Data Warehousing, Application Development, Knowledge Management, CRM, Process Improvement, Portfolio Management and Enterprise Project Management.

NEW SELECTS - Walter Karl - Description: This file contains brides who mostly fall between the ages of 21 and 33. They have purchased products for weddings through a variety of catalogs including products designed for "specialty" weddings. These include weddings planned at a vacation spot or on a cruise ship, weddings with a country flair, and weddings with a seasonal them, and weddings with a Christian orientation.

NEW MANAGEMENT - Macromark - Description: This file contains consumers who have watched a long form infomercial and responded by calling an 800 number and making a purchase. They have spent between $100 and $260 and are credit card buyers. The product line consists of appliances, cleaning products and exercise equipment.